Steven rejected Harry Potter because he had to raise his children in Los Angeles and give his family proper time. In a recent interview with ‘RRR’ director ‘SS Rajamouli’, Spielberg discussed his personal experience with the real-life conflict between art and family.
“Steven Spielberg‘s autobiographical drama “The Fabelmans,” which examines the artist’s struggle to manage family and career as a child, has put him in contention for another Oscar for Best Director.”
Why Steven rejected Harry Potter???
Steven Spielberg was recently interviewed by S.S. Rajamouli the director of “RRR“. During the interview, Spielberg discussed a real-life difficulty he had later in his career when he had to choose between raising his children in Los Angeles and directing the first “Harry Potter” film for Warner Bros. in London, posing a contradiction between his work and his family and as a result Steven rejected Harry Potter instead.
In the interview, the “Fabelmans” director complimented the Indian hit ‘RRR’ as “eye candy” and pledged to return to India for one of his future films, where he last filmed in 1976.
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After meeting briefly at a cocktail party in Los Angeles in January, Spielberg and Rajamouli reconnected via Zoom. Reliance Entertainment, a long-term collaborator of Spielberg’s Amblin Entertainment, co-produced and distributed “The Fabelmans” theatrically in India on February 10. The movie is nominated for a total of seven Academy Awards, including best picture.
“The personal meaning about art and family will tear you in half happened to me later, after I had already established myself as a filmmaker and as a working director,” Spielberg explained in that interview. He further added, “Kate and I started raising a family and we started having children. The choice I had to make was taking a job that would move me to another country for four or five months where I wouldn’t see my family every day…That was a ripping kind of experience.”
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“There were several films I chose not to make,” he continued, and that’s the reason why Steven rejected Harry Potter. “I chose to turn down the first ‘Harry Potter’ to basically spend that next year and a half with my family, my young kids growing up. So I’d sacrificed a great franchise, which today looking back I’m very happy to have done, to be with my family.”
Watch The Interview
Chris Columbus eventually directed “Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone,” the first movie in Warner Bros.’ eight-film franchise. The film has to be shot in London, which is why Steven rejected Harry Potter and chose to stay in the United States and raise his children.
Yet, it’s not that he has ceased directing. The director shot “A.I. Artificial Intelligence” around the same time as the first “Harry Potter” picture in 2000, with the only distinction being that “A.I.” was mostly shot in Los Angeles, allowing Spielberg to stay near his family and watch his kids grow.
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